This was one heck of a busy week, so sit back, get a drink and enjoy the show (okay, it won’t be that exciting of a show but you should still subscribe and smash that like button). Google launched passage ranking on Wednesday night, this is where Google can rank specific passages from a document, well, it went live in the US English results, not globally, as they said but it still should be a big deal. Google may have released an unconfirmed update around February 8th, this is unrelated to passage indexing rolling out. Google announced that back in November 2020 it released an image update aimed at reducing duplicate images and improving image refinements. Google launched a whole new set of manual actions, or penalties, aimed at Google News and Google Discover. Google is still rolling out dark themes, with a big push this week, but the ads on dark mode are so hard to notice. Google said it can recognize if a site has a good reputation in a specific topic area. Google on the other end said there is no such thing as levels of site quality demotions. Google said when it comes to the core web vitals metrics it may take into account pages not in its index. Google may be coming out with a search appearance filter for the page experience update label in the performance report within Google Search Console. John Mueller of Google released a great video on image SEO. Google said it likely ignores spammy blog pingback links. Google gave SEO advice on what to do if you remove site functionality to show a sign of support for social action. Google is rolling out scroll-to-text on the free organic product results. Microsoft Bing launched Speller100 to help with understanding spelling mistakes in search, which is in about 15% of all searches. Bing is testing recommended queries and sites based on search activity and what’s currently popular. Finally, Google Ads updated the lead form extension to trigger off the click of a headline. Oh and if you want to help sponsor those vlogs, go to patreon.com/barryschwartz. That was the search news this week at the Search Engine Roundtable.

SPONSOR: This week’s video recap is sponsored by Semrush, the beloved SEO toolset provider.

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Search Topics of Discussion:
Google Passage Ranking Is Live In The US English Results
Unconfirmed Google Search Ranking Algorithm Update February 8th
Google Image Search Update Reduces Duplicate Images (November 2020)
New: Google News & Discover Manual Actions In Search Console
Google: Manual Actions For News or Discover Do Not Impact Search
Google Search Tests Dark Mode Theme Controls
Google Search Dark Mode Makes Ads Harder To Distinguish From Organic Listings
Google Can Recognize If A Site Has A Good Reputation On A Specific Topic Area
Google: No Such Thing As Levels Of Site Quality Demotions
Google Search May Use Core Web Vitals Data From Noindexed Pages
Google Search Console Page Experience Appearance Filter In Performance Report
Google Video On Image SEO In Detail With 12 Tips
Google Ignores Low Quality Blog Pingback Links
Google Search Prefers To Neutralize The Effect Of Spam
Google SEO Advice On Temporarily Removing Site Functionality In Support Of Action
Google Search Scroll To Text On Free Product Results
Microsoft Bing: 15% Of Searches Are Misspelled So Speller100 To The Rescue
Bing Search Recommends Queries & Sites Based On Activity & What’s Popular
Google Ads Lead Form Now Triggers On Headline Click

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